Afropop.org's top 10 for 2003, what do ya think?

Festival in the Desert I find a bit uneven but it has some great muezzin meets what sounds like blues stuff on it by by Tartit and Tinariwen and Ali Farke Toure. Oumou Sangare's on it as well.

Anybody heard any of the others? I've liked recented Mapfumo cds but haven't heard the 2003 one...

Banning Eyre and Sean Barlow seem to like veteran musicians and music that carries on traditional sounds from the past. Kekele from the Congo are supposed to be a throwback.

Banning's book "In Griot Time" about living with and learning how to play Malian style guitar with the Super Rail Band's Djelimady Tounkara is fascinating. I bet that Super Rail cd is great.

Virtually none of their top 10 have had any marketing push behind them in America(and elsewhere in the English-speaking world), so alas they get very little attention in the English-speaking world.

I don't think any of them incorporate hiphop, grime, dancehall, microhouse, garage-rock or 1981 style postpunk into their sounds either.

Predictably, the only one I've heard is the Palmieri album, which I don't think deserves to be on such a list. It has two or three tracks I like a lot, including a remake of his old song "Lo Que Traigo es Sabroso," but overall it's just kind of okay.

I didn't find much African pop music I liked back when I was hearing it on the radio, but there has to be something there that I would like (outside of North of African things and Fela, which I already do like to varying degrees). The traditional things I often liked a bit more, but I don't really know anything about that music.

I finally got that Konono 1 video (not mentioned on this thread or anything) to load on a PC at work, and I liked the music that went with it. I hope the CD comes out soon (or at all, for that matter).

I've only given it a single, partial listen, but the Super Rail cd seemed very good.

So I posted the afropop.org list on the music forum at africaonline.com and there some folked complained that the list didn't include Congolese artists like Zaiko Langa langa.

Another guy said it wasn't that bad a list if you liked more acoustic sounding stuff that's aimed at aging middlebrow folks.

If you like the Super Rail CD, the Djelmedi Tounkara solo disc is great. (Also, if you're thinking of going for Super Rail, I'd say get the solo record instead.)

Isn't Amandla a collection of mostly old stuff? The last Kekele record was nice, very trad, haven't heard this one.

Where do you guys generally get your African pop info?

I like Super Rail which is electric with a band better than Djelimadi solo, although the latter is nice. I have the solo cd--I missed Djelimadi's free show in DC this past summer as I was out of town.

I get my afropop info from The Beat magazine(a Los Angeles based publication with contributors from around the world). I'm not even sure if they have a website. I also get the afropop.org e-mail list. If you're a New Yorker their included list of NY shows is probably helpful. They have a syndicated public radio show that is not carried where I am here in the Washington DC area but may be wherever you are.
I look at Sterns website and check out their top seling cds. I also ocassionally go to Africaonline.com where i click on "forums" and then "music". There a small handful of mostly Congolese folks living in Europe and the US talk and argue about their Congolese favorites. Sometimes when I can, I get over to Simba Records in Langely Park, MD and just ask questions and listen to cds there.

This past summer the Smithsonian Folklife Festival in Washington DC spotlighted Malian music. I sadly missed Oumou Sangare's gig and Salif Keita's but saw Ali Farka Toure and many others including a new to me act called Neba Solo. Neba Solo had several balifon(xylaphone like instrument)players and a trap drummer and were oh so funky. The cd I bought didn't quite capture their live feel. I saw 'em a few times there.

At the music forum at africaonline.com someone is touting Zaiko Langa Langa's "Eureka" cd and Quartier Latin Integral's "Voodoo" album.

Someone also posted a thread there about a South African based(I think) award program called the Kora awards. Posters there were dissing the program as being bland and Grammy like, although some of them said they liked some of the nominees.

I caught Djelimadi in Chicago last fall. The sound was terrible--there was a buzz throughout--and Banning Eyre was kind of a nuisance, making announcements and such. (His book is pretty great though, I agree). Despite that, a good show. Super Rail has been awesome when I've seen them, but the performances don't transfer to disc for me as well as DT's acoustic solo disc.

never gave Festival the chance I probably should have, but I can always remedy that. didn't like Amandla at all, really--am I wrong for this?

Well, how do you feel about South African pop in general?

Matos and Dock, I haven't heard it but is reflective of current South African pop or is it political vocal harmony compositions that reflect some of prior South African pop trends but not all? Not to be too picky about it but the details might help...

― Steve Kiviat (Steve K), Monday, 1 December 2003 15:35 (twenty-two years ago)

that should read "is reflective..."

― Steve Kiviat (Steve K), Monday, 1 December 2003 15:36 (twenty-two years ago)

I can't get those italics to work... Is Amandla reflective...

Madagascar dude
Miary Lepiera
should have been on there

So Lepiera's Soro cd on Tinder is good. The Afropop folks (Eyre and Barlow) just listed that Tulear Never Sleeps comp from Madagascar.

yeah, it's really good;
madagascar-pop ain't real,
but he invents it

Here, check it out:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B00007MB6Z/qid=1070313584/sr=2-1/ref=sr_2_1/104-9046483-5090366

I like SA pop a lot, though of the recent stuff I've heard (which isn't much) I much prefer kwaito to some of the poppier stuff. (how's that for vague?)

Oh yeah, now I remember reading an interview with the director of the Amandla movie who said he deliberately chose certain historic South African music selections(by Hugh Masekela and others) and avoided mbquanqa (spelling?) because he considered the latter too pop and not political enough. He came across as a highbrow snob to me, although others might argue that he'd have ended up with a multi-disc compilation that wouldn't entirely fit the movie's theme if he went with more of that '80s Soweto mbquanqa style.

Here's a Congolese top 10 for 2003 posted at africaonline

1. Ala que leu leu - Werra Son
2. Affaire Ngulu - Mr Siatula
3. Eureka - Zaiko Langa Langa
4. Quatre Coins Kindala - Akademia
5. Arret Cardiaque - G7
6. Nouvel Ordre - King Kester
7. Vodoo - Quartier Latin Integral
8. Mondongo - Awilo Longomba
9. Fara Fara - Various
10. Affaire d'etat - Koffi Olomide

i'm getting into some dangerous territory here, so i'm gonna make explicit my afropop ignorance at the outset - but south african 'pop' that isn't kwaito/modified hiphop is kinda automatically backwards-looking i'd say. dont know much about mbaqanga, doing some internet research (ha yes this is how i find out about my own country's musical heritage), one site locates kwaito as the most recent incarnation/'evolution' of mbaqanga. btw i read a kwaito review in the paper a couple days ago that was just horrible - it decried the "mindless american house rhythms" of most kwaito, while praising the 50s township influence evident in the new mafikizolo album. i wouldn't mind so much if this was an isolated instance, but it seems that mafikizolo are the only 'respectable' kwaito act around, with a traceable heritage of 'influence' and other such legitimizing forces. i'd tell you to get an m'du or a zola album before you go for the 'respectable' choice, but i don't think kwaito's much of an album genre anyway. not sure that i'm the best person to talk about it tho.

Mitch, you are right in your description of South African music. Mbaqanga is the township sound of the '80s (and farther back) and Hugh Masekela is from well, even farther back. Interestingly when I saw old-timers the Mahotello Queens in DC the mostly South African emigree audience happily danced to both their tradition-rooted sound as well as to the kwaito (house influenced) tracks the dj played before and after.

Mitch, do you know anything about the kora awards coming up in South Africa in a couple of days? Any kwaito there? I see on the kora awards website there are nominees listed for many different regions of Africa.